Adding Sand To Gravel With Plants

So my girlfriend wanted to add sand to her gravel for her corys that she will get. But there is plants in the gravel and I know that you have to stir the sand to get gas out of it. So how do you do this without messing up the plants every time you do a water change. There are no fish in there at the moment.

 

What kind of gravel do you have? Picture helps. Cory’s do fine in gravel. If adding sand to gravel the sand will seep past the gravel to the bottom.

 

It's just average natural round gravel and we already put the sand in. So once the sand goes to the bottom will it need stirred or can it just be left alone or should we just switch to one or the other

 

I would say one or the other. Round gravel is fine for Cory’s. How big are the grains of gravel 1/8”,1/4” or 3/8”. The first 2 are fine for plants and Cory’s. The 3/8” gravel in my opinion let’s to much muck get past it to the bottom. The Cory’s can’t move the gravel so they can’t eat the food caught in it.

 

I would say its between 1/8 and a1/4 would it be fine with a bit of sand mixed in or would it cause problems down the line

 

Here is a picture of the sand and gravel

 

Yes that’s fine

 

Just a word of caution. Eventually with water movement or fish movement the finer substrate will sift into the less fine substrate. I have yet to find a solution to this. With my sand/gravel tank I find that I'm able to pull the sand back on top of the gravel with the vacuum. You just have to be mindful not to suck the sand out. My 2 cents.

 

Thank you I just dont want there to be any gas build up in the sand I guess is what I was getting at.

 

I wonder by covering up the original gravel like that if your bb in the gravel would start to die off and cause a ammonia spike. I'm not saying it will but I would keep an eye on it. I would hate to see that green fish go belly up!